Bailiff/Sheriff Department: A Cesspool Of Corruption By BAYO AKINLADE
What is the essence of justice if one cannot reap its benefits? Why go to court and be there for several years only to get a judgement in your favour but you cannot enforce it and thus lose the benefit of it?
One area of our justice system that needs our attention is the issue of enforcement of Court Orders and Judgements. It is unfortunate that we have laws that ensure that court judgements are obeyed yet those same laws have provisions that lawyers have cleverly used to circumvent justice.
The Role of Lawyers in corrupting enforcement of Judgements
There are two principal ways lawyers have developed in compromising the justice system in this regard:
1. The abuse of the Appeal Proceedings
Lawyers have taken advantage of the slow pace of our justice system, the over-crowded docket of the courts and the lack of an adequate number of judges available to handle cases to abuse the process.
While the constitution gives one the right to appeal to a higher court if the person feels he has not obtained justice at the court of first instant, this process has, however, been abused by lawyers to the extent that our courts are no longer respected as courts of justice.
The courts on the other hand have sought to rectify this problem by pronouncing that an appeal or notice of an appeal does not act as a stay of Proceedings at the lower court nor does it stop the enforcement of a ruling or judgement of a lower court, but nevertheless; the same lower court have many times refused to abide by the pronouncement of the higher court on this … WHY? I will give you a hint later.
2. The Sheriff and Civil Processes Act requires that in enforcing a judgement of a court, the Nigeria Police are to be involved to provide security. Now this provision, though well-meaning, has created an avenue for corruption and has hindered the enforcement of court orders and judgements. I will not go into details but we all know that the police will demand money before they accompany a judgment creditor and the Court Bailiff to enforce anything.
Many lawyers use these requirements to have a policeman present to enforce orders of the court to compromise justice as they can simply bribe the police and stall any execution of the Judgement of the Court.
Lawyers have also been known to procure fake judgements and orders with the help of the staff of the Judiciary….even judges and magistrates are alleged to be involved in this horrible practice.
The Role of the Courts In a recent complaint received by Fight Against Corruption In The Judiciary (FIACIJ) against the National Industrial Court; we see clearly the corruption within the court itself especially if a judge or the chief judge himself is interested in the case.
This, of course, is a most unfortunate situation which makes a gross mockery of the entire justice system. The internal procedures of some judiciaries requiring the Chief Judge to sign off on almost every enforcement of its judgements is a scandal, to say the least.
FIACIJ had cause to investigate and interrogate the Sheriff Department of the High Court of Lagos a few years back and discovered that a certain Chief Judge personally reviewed almost every item that was meant to be auctioned by the court and dealt with those items corruptly to the detriment of the Judgement creditor and basically to all parties concerned.
Why are we keeping silent? Why are litigants and lawyers not raising any of the alarms? Why have our Bar Associations and anti-corruption agencies turned a blind eye to these subtle corrupt practices that damage the integrity of our justice system?
We have to STOP these acts of internal sabotage of our justice system.
FIACIJ condemns these acts and calls out all heads of courts and lawyers involved in this disgraceful practice to desist from compromising our Justice system.
We are monitoring, we are watching and we are collecting evidence against perpetrators of these acts…… the day of reckoning is near!
Culled from INDEPENDENT
